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Comment by sbilstein | Hacker News Reader

Just an anecdote but at the depths of a bout of depression I had several years ago I decided to watch “the bridge”, a documentary profiling people have committed suicide by jumping off the Golden Gate Bridge.

Suicidal ideation absolutely increased for me and I even drove up to a bridge in Spokane just to “think about it.” I thought about jumping for about 10 minutes before I got in my car, drove home, and set up some time to talk to a therapist. I absolutely can see how a movie can push someone over the edge. I was lucky to get home and see my roommate had invited a few friends over...took me out of my thoughts long enough to recognize just how close I had gotten.

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wow, thank you for writing that. Must be hard to recall something so personal. I'm sorry to hear about you going through that in any way at all from the beginning. I hope you're doing better now.

Thank you. I’m definitely doing better now :) running my own startup and happy with my dog and partner. Suicidal thoughts and depression are phases you can heal from with therapy, support, and potentially medication. I feel strongly for people who are down—you can get through this!

Thank you for sharing your story - glad to hear you are doing better now. I truly appreciate people who are open about their mental health journey because of how much help and validation it can offer others.

Sending positive vibes your way!

That is great film but it had the opposite effect for me and everyone I talked to who watched it. They tell some pretty scary stories in it...

Gosh, I found that movie so depressing I just had to turn it off. I very rarely stop watching a movie halfway through.

Misery loves company, unfortunately.

Interesting downvotes, considering that statement is the entire gist of the results of the study, as well as a counterpoint to the parent comment and the reasoning behind the grandparent comment.

While the film's subject matter is certainly intense, I had a positive take-away from it as well, which is that a large percentage of people who experience a failed suicide attempt are glad they failed. This was the logic used to justify constructing suicide prevention barriers on bridges. If you take away the immediate opportunity for people to take their own lives, a few determined people may find another way, but many more will give up their attempt.

Isn't this just (literal) survivorship bias? I'd think that people that want to kill themselves very much would try again until they succeed, leaving only people who did not desire to die as strongly to report on how they felt about their failed attempt.

A failed suicide attempt at the bridge is still a traumatic event that puts you in the hospital. It will take some time before you have the opportunity to try again, and if you succeed, the fact that you failed in your previous attempt will be known to anyone doing a study.

This would be true except that a large percentage of suicides are snap decisions in the moment, not planned out. For example, switching to natural gas from coal gas in the UK ended up dropping suicide rates in general.[0]

I also read another study that looked at two similar bridges about a mile or so away from each other: 1 bridge was popular for suicides, and as such had guards put up. You'd think that those people would have just gone to the other bridge, but suicide rates declined in general. I can't find the source at the moment.

[0]: https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/means-matter/means-matter/saves...

> I'd think that people that want to kill themselves very much would try again until they succeed

No, this is a myth. Clearly there are differences in suicidality. Some people self harm frequently and severely for years before dying. Other people experience "rapid onset despair" and make an attempt.

Recovery is possible for both groups. Most people who attempt suicide do not make another attempt.

There's probably some data in the English NCISH reports here: https://sites.manchester.ac.uk/ncish/

(Also, I'm not trying to police your language. Use whatever words you like. But if you're talking to suicide researchers you may want to avoid "sucessful" or "failed" suicide, and use "died by suicide" or "killed themselves" (both for the UK) or "completed suicide" for the US.)

> I had a positive take-away from it as well, which is that a large percentage of people who experience a failed suicide attempt are glad they failed.

I watched the film during a time in my life when I was very depressed. I noticed that the data they used to draw this conclusion was something like a survey of how many people had reattempted suicide. Prevention techniques were considered a success if the person ultimately did not kill themself.

On the flip side, I seem to remember one woman who noted a paradox that sometimes when people are treated and start to feel better, that's when they find the motivation to actually carry out a suicide plan. As I recall she sort of calls into question whether the treatment is actually a good idea if it will lead to that outcome.

What I noticed (and felt quite bitter about at the time) is that everyone seemed to be focused almost entirely on their own goals (avoiding the anguish of their loved one dying) and somewhat oblivious to the goals of their suffering friend or family member (escaping the anguish they likely feel all or most of the time).

The metric for success should be not "did this person ultimately avoid dying" but "did this person find a way to keep living without being in misery?" To show that you need to know more than just whether the person died or not.

> The metric for success should be not "did this person ultimately avoid dying" but "did this person find a way to keep living without being in misery?"

I would agree with your metric for success. You're absolutely correct that the former (by itself) isn't sufficient. My point is that it's hard to accomplish the latter (sp?) without first accomplishing the former.

> On the flip side, I seem to remember one woman who noted a paradox that sometimes when people are treated and start to feel better, that's when they find the motivation to actually carry out a suicide plan.

I'd be interested to see how many people who have contemplated suicide fall into the category you describe, as a percentage of the total group. I'd hope (perhaps a bit optimistically?) that they are in the minority. But I don't have data to make any claims one way or the other.

Thank you for sharing your experience. I hope you're in a better place now.

Yea I hear you. Not one I recommend watching!

I'm very glad you got the help you needed. There are reasons to keep going!

Glad you pulled yourself out friend. Thank you for the insight. I always hated when kids would say "kill yourself" or similar in high school for this very reason. Hope you're doing well.

Man...nobody said that when I was in high school (30 years ago). Times have changed.

The Internet has definitely increased the proliferation of such behavior.

Has it? Do we have any reason to believe this is definite? Moreover, do we have any evidence that this behavior didn't exist or existed at a lesser scale 30 years ago? Maybe the GP simply did not see it happening.

Either way it seems like speculation, maybe it should be presented as such instead of stating it as fact?

Insisting on evidence that proves a negative claim is an impossible standard. In the absence of evidence one can assume that a statement is anecdotal, especially when information like location and timeframe are not included.

I guess I could have been more clear-

I don't believe these anecdotes reflect reality, and I don't think they really bring anything of substance to the conversation. It's borderline alarmist at best.

If you played xbox or something similar 10 years ago I think you would agree. Nonetheless, I am happy to be wrong in this situation. YMMV

Mean kids said all sorts of insulting things, but it was more related to personal appearance (fat, ugly etc.) or "your mama" jokes.

In my experience it's teens being edgy, not meant seriously. But when it's a depressed person hearing it you never know.

Tbf 30 years ago fights seemed common whereas there were very few when I was in school. Seems like physical violence has evolved into verbal because it's harder to trace and punish. (Just a guess)

Interesting that the movie "Heathers" came out 30 years ago this year. It's about exactly this thing. If you didn't experience it 30 years ago, you may have been simply lucky.

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